Author: artsyhonker

So why does a poor East London church need a pipe organ, anyway?

Byartsyhonker October 8, 2012 4 Comments
At St Andrew's Leytonstone we're hosting a hymnathon this weekend, to raise money for the repair of our pipe organ. Fundraising is going well, but there have been some questions. In this time of austerity, unemployment and recession, what are we doing raising money to pay for the repair of an instrument a century old? Can't we just get an electric organ, and spend the money on more useful things,...

Transfiguration

Byartsyhonker October 3, 2012 1 Comment
One of the challenges of my job is finding music appropriate for our small choir at St Andrew's. The Anglican choral tradition is wonderful and beautiful and has a tendency to assume you have altos, tenors, basses and a positive horde of boy sopranos at your disposal. The reality is a bit different, and attempting the music of a large, well-stocked cathedral when we are a tiny parish with an...

Through a glass, darkly

Byartsyhonker September 14, 2012 0 Comments
I really like this picture, taken by best beloved in the course of a bunch of other pictures for the purposes of organ fundraising. More about the hymnathon will follow in the next few days. There's a month to go, so I'm not really doing very much else at this stage! Tarquin is going to come and disable some of the bellows to try and give us a few more months, as the organ is really not working...

Changing Horizons

Byartsyhonker August 4, 2012 1 Comment
I'm visiting ancestral lands, and part of this particular trip has involved sorting through the last of my things in my father's house, which will be put up for sale in spring 2013. It's been an emotional few days.  I may write at more length on the process later, or I may not. I found this poem by my grandmother in the front pages of a folder full f my grandfather's coin collection, and thought...

Flash Compline Wednesday 18th July

Byartsyhonker July 16, 2012 0 Comments
There will be a Flash Compline service at 9.30pm on Wednesday, 18th July 2012, at Christ Church Greyfriars, near St Paul's tube - here's a map Music: We will use this setting of Compline. We will have a small number of spare copies, which you can purchase for £2 if you want to keep them, or borrow if you don't. Don't worry if you aren't a confident singer -- follow along with the text and see...

Let all the world in every corner sing.

Byartsyhonker July 13, 2012 7 Comments
I had a bit of a rant on Twitter this morning. I was upset by the government's continued assault on the poor and vulnerable through the dismantling of the welfare state, and I was frustrated with churches for what seems like apathy in the face of it, though it may be that it's closer to self-preservation than lack of care. Too often, it seems, we want to leave "politics" out of our religious...

More on the same Measure

Byartsyhonker July 10, 2012 0 Comments
Background update: voting on the amended Measure for the consecration of women as bishops was adjourned until November in light of opposition to Clause 5.1.c (the second amendment by the House of Bishops, which I discussed in a previous post). The House of Bishops will meet in September to discuss what to do next. Rev Peter Ould, who I follow on Twitter, said this: The main objection to Clause...

A call for words…

Byartsyhonker July 5, 2012 1 Comment
So, I wrote some words last night, rather too many in fact, about my interpretation of various Church of England stuff. That post has received over three hundred hits, more than all my posts on organ fundraising combined. I joked about this on Twitter, asking if I could make the organ fundraising more controversial... ...and someone remarked I could only do that if I were the wife of the Dean of...

A Provisional Note

Byartsyhonker July 4, 2012 5 Comments
The dear old Church of England has been tying itself into knots of late over the Bishops' amendments to the Measure on Women in the Episcopate. The good bishops made two amendments. One has been welcomed as providing some clarity about exactly from where episcopal power is derived in the case of an alternative bishop being assigned to a parish (essentially it's the inherent bishoppy-ness, not the...

State of the Organ

Byartsyhonker July 4, 2012 0 Comments
So, I had a chat with our organ tuner, Tarquin Wiggins, on Friday. He'd visited on Thursday and found the organ so bad that he had to abort tuning. The four leather bellows needing repair are now leaking very badly, with the result that the system is losing pressure very easily. Parishioners at St Andrew's may have noticed the organ cutting out intermittently during the last hymn on Sunday; this...